Born in Uttar Pradesh, Aggarwal completed her Masters of Science in Research from the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad, and came to Australia in 2014 to pursue her PhD. Passionate about her work, she says she hardly feels homesick and loves Melbourne, its uncertain weather notwithstanding. “It is really a lovely, peaceful and beautiful city.” In conversation with Deepti Aggarwal.
The first thought of being a scientist came to me when I watched the movie, Mr India, in my eighth grade. I was very impressed with the idea of a scientist making a wrist watch that makes people invisible but visible in certain lights. Since then the dream of becoming a scientist was there in my subconscious mind. But I was never confident that I will be a scientist someday.
The motivation to develop smart socks came from my first PhD study, which was to understand how physiotherapists organise video consultations and what challenges they face in assessing and treating patients over a distance. Through this study, I found that physiotherapists are not able to understand the subtle differences in a patient’s lower limb movements when the patient performs exercises such as walking, squats or tip toes during video consultations. Lack of complete understanding of a patient’s movements reduced the physiotherapist’s confidence in the assessment and made the treatment less specific.
The technology name, SoPhy, has two parts: One, a pair of socks with sensors is attached that captures data related to weight distribution, range of movement and foot orientation. Two, a web-interface present captures information on a screen. During a video consultation, when the patient puts on these socks and performs movements like walking and squats, the socks capture the movement data and sends it to the physiotherapist in real-time through Internet. The physiotherapist can then see how the patient is distributing the body weight over their feet, how they are orienting their feet and how far the foot is moving for different exercises in real-time.
The SoPhy system is useful for anyone - from the young to the elderly - who is struggling in doing lower body movements normally. Some examples include people undergoing lower limb rehabilitation after stroke, fracture, sports injury and those having chronic pain conditions.
The trial at the Royal Children's Hospital showed positive results and the clinical staff is willing to incorporate the system as part of their clinical practise at the hospital. However, it is only the tip of the iceberg. There are many hurdles along the way. Firstly, video consultations are still an emerging practise, and only a few hospitals in Australia as well as across the world have accepted video consultations as a formal clinical practise. To bring SoPhy into the clinical practise, these hospitals should first start to offer video consultations services to their patients. Other challenge includes making the socks commercially available so that a larger audience can avail its benefits. In short, it would still take a couple of years to see the technology as a common practise at the hospital - the day I am eagerly waiting for.
Right now the biggest hurdle for me is the funding to extend this work to another level.
In Australia, research in video consultation has a promising outcome because Australian population is ageing and because the population in Australia is sparse. Video consultations can provide a platform to connect remotely available patients with their doctors in cases when they can’t make a physical trip to the hospital, e.g., in severe pain.
The biggest achievement for me is the strong relationship that I have developed with the Royal Children’s Hospital and Murdoch Children’s Research Institute through my PhD work. In February 2017, I also got an Honorary Appointment at the Royal Children’s Hospital.
I just finished my PhD. My PhD research has opened several directions to extend this work further at the hospital setting with physiotherapists and patients. Currently, I am in conversation with the hospital staff and my supervisors at the university to decide which path to take forward.
I am interested in pursuing a career in academia, and would like to be known as an expert in video consultations.
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